Who

Olympics Without NBC

If you’re in the USA, and want to see how Olympics coverage should be done,
consider grabbing this video of the BBC’s coverage of the opening ceremonies
inthreeparts. You’ll need a
Bittorrent client like Azureus to download
these, and probably also the DivX video codec. The
movie files are quite large – about 700 Mb per part – but worth it.

Typically, I hate spectacles like this – they’re usually full of noise and
bombast, but signify nothing other than spending. This presentation grabbed
me, though – I found it, if not understated, at least stately. The fact
that I’m a mythology
geek might have something
to do with that. It’s the same video feed that NBC used, yet without Katie
Couric’s incessant babbling you can actually follow the narrative. (I almost
choked when one of the NBC commentators attributed “know thyself,” the dictum
of the Oracle, to Socrates.)

I remember in 1980, NBC test broadcast a football game without any announcers.
It was the Miami Dolphins vs. the New York Jets. No voiceovers. No play by
play. Just the game, and the occasional graphics telling you stats and game
positions. It was one of the best games I ever watched. They never did it
again. They probably never will. So it’s a serious question I have for NBC:
why is your coverage so awful? Why are you so afraid of airtime that isn’t
filled by the chiaccharare-batcheat-chitchat of your chirpy and uninformed
magpies? Who is responsible for this? Does your market research show that
people would rather listen to your talking heads babble about what we’re
watching rather than actually listen to the show they tuned in to watch? Do
you really think you’re going to be able to compete in the global marketplace
in 2008, when instead of having to wait all of 24 hours to see the BBC feed,
I’ll be able to watch it live as it happens? Because if you do, it’s time for
me to short-sell General Electric.